


for you I would

by rockethop



Category: Parks and Recreation
Genre: Angst, Authority Challenge, Babies, Baby Names, Birthday, Birthday Fluff, Consensual Kink, F/M, First Time, Fluff, Insecurity, Jealousy, Light Angst, Praise Kink, Pregnancy, Spanking, Surprises, Teething, Toddlers, Triplets, Wedding Rings, authority kink
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-08 03:47:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 7,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26769007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rockethop/pseuds/rockethop
Summary: A collection of drabbles for Ink/Fictober 2020, ranging in topics and ratings. Story rating will reflect the most explicitly rated drabble with a warning before any NSFW drabbles.
Relationships: Leslie Knope/Ben Wyatt
Comments: 26
Kudos: 26





	1. "No, come back"

**Author's Note:**

> Hi all!! I wanted to attempt to write a drabble a day for the month of October while following the prompt list that can be found on tumblr (https://fictober-event.tumblr.com/prompts20). This one ended up being a bit longer than I anticipated, but I like the way it turned out.
> 
> Day 1 - "No, come back."
> 
> Having Ben spend the night after their first time sleeping together is too risky, Leslie thinks. That is, until she changes her mind.

“You can’t stay here,” Leslie finally decides.

They’d been debating for the last fifteen minutes about how to proceed from this point. Admittedly, they hadn’t done much thinking about what to do  _ after  _ the fact. It’s not that Leslie hadn’t given it any thought - she’d allowed herself to consider the possibility once or twice - or ten times a day - before admonishing herself for daring to broach the subject. And though she couldn’t speak for Ben, she had a pretty good reason to believe that he also hadn’t ruled out the possibility of their getting together, judging by his posture in Indianapolis as she sighed and leaned closer in the uncomfortable men’s athleticwear that Chris had dug out of the recesses of his closet for her.

She slips out from under the comforter, dragging the top sheet down to the floor with her while fumbling for her shirt in the dark.

“Leslie,” Ben sighs with a hint of entertainment seeping into his voice. “You know what we just did, right? There’s no need for all… that.” He laughs. “Just redress.”

Her fingers close around the cotton of a discarded t-shirt and she pulls it over her head, unable to discern whether she’d put it on correctly or whether she’d already worn it. The tag scratches at the front of her throat and she groans before adjusting it to the proper direction. “It’s not that I don’t want you to see me, it’s just weird to think about.” She cinches the sheet around her torso to hide her bare bottom half.

“What, me watching you get dressed?”

“No. Well, yeah. I don’t know.”

“You know that it’s like, really dark in here, right? I can’t see anything that’s more than a few inches away.”

“Yeah, well…”

She’d insisted that they make love in the dark. She’d told herself that, no, this request wasn’t irrational and that it didn’t stem from years of disappointments in dark bedsheets, it was just to help to put her at ease given the vulnerability of the acts they were about to perform, that’s all. It wasn’t so he couldn’t see her faking it if their encounter should play out like all of the others. It wasn’t so she could pretend she was satisfied if it ended far too soon. It wasn’t so he couldn’t see her visible disappointment when he’d used her for his own gratification and inevitably rushed back to his own place like every other man she’d offered a piece of herself to in recent history.

It was just a preference, nothing more.

And Ben, bless his heart, had agreed without fuss or hesitation. He’d just smiled and flipped the switch back to its original position before leading her tenderly to her bed into uncharted territory and unimaginable euphoric highs, making her see every unnamed star and imperceivable color not yet discovered. All while being gracious and thoughtful and sensitive and she thinks it’s enough to justify losing her job if it means he’ll do it again with that ever-persistent look of adoration that he tries to hide but can never truly quite conceal.

“You can’t stay,” she repeats. “It’s just too big of a risk. What if,” she looks frantically around the dark room in search of an excuse. “What if Chris decides to run past here in a few hours for his morning run? Or past your place? What if he tries to make you run with him?”

“He’s not going to.”

“But how can you be sure? How can you know?”

Ben sighs once more. “Okay, I can’t. You got me. I just,” his hands fall with a thud into his lap. “I guess when I’d thought of this I didn’t see myself leaving right away. It’s just not the way that I prefer to do things. At least not when I like someone as much as I like you.”

The beginnings of a smile play at the corner of her lips and she’s overcome by the need to urge to conceal herself further, to retreat once more into the safety of the emotional upper hand that is being the least expressively affectionate. She’d never had the privilege before now. She then decides that the apathetic approach isn’t for her, at least not with him of all people. She hears the rustling of fabric as he dresses wordlessly on the opposite side of the bed before he pulls the door open with a creak. He stands motionless in the frame, his silhouette only scarcely perceptible against the soft glow of light spilling upstairs from one of the downstairs lamps.

“Not that it matters, because it really doesn’t, but I think you’re wearing my undershirt.”

He turns and exits. He descends rhythmically down the stairs at what Leslie thinks could only be described as a trot and detects the jingling of metal as he retrieves his keys from her entryway table. Leslie inhales deeply, the traces of his cologne filling her nostrils as she pulls the t-shirt’s collar up to her face. In a sudden change of heart, she snatches her underwear from the floor and pulls them over her hips, only just barely managing to stay upright as she rushes to jam each leg into their respective hole and descend the staircase. To her dismay, the door closes with a definitive click just as she makes contact with the ground floor. Leslie curses under her breath and mutters a plea to whatever higher power may or may not be listening. With any luck, her neighbors would be fast asleep at the early morning hour and unaware of her covert rendezvous and subsequent declaration that she, indeed, wanted the intimacy that accompanies laying in a lover’s embrace after a night of passion. That she  _ needed  _ the affection.

She flings the door open and chases after his retreating car in her driveway, wearing nothing but his undershirt and her panties, dodging the stones that line the pavement as she rounds the corner lest they cut her bare feet. Ben scrunches his face incredulously when she pops in front of his headlights. He rolls down the window.

“Leslie, what the hell are you doing?”

She scrambles to the driver’s side of his car and squats down in hopes that being between his car and hers will shield her from any onlookers. From her position, she can make out the glint of amusement in his dark eyes and what she suspects is reverence, or something close to it. The idling car hums against the chirp of the crickets and Leslie shivers in her current state of undress. She crosses her arms over her abdomen.

“I thought you said-”

“No, come back! I changed my mind,” she exclaims in a hushed whisper. She watches as his eyes trail up and down her body before briefly falling upon her chest and flicking back up to her eyes. With a downward glance, she realizes that what’s garnered his attention is her nipples, hardened by the chilled air, their circular outline just barely visible through the thin white fabric. She rolls her eyes and tosses her hair over her shoulder. “Hurry up, I’m cold. Don’t make me warm up by myself.”

She hoists herself up again and dashes towards the house, casting an impish glance over her shoulder as Ben chuckles and struggles to put the vehicle in park.

She decides that it will take a while for her to be warm again.


	2. "That's the easy part"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leslie and Ben decide on names for their children and Leslie laments the loss of her sex appeal.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Day 2 of Fictober - "That's the easy part"
> 
> I'm like 1.5 days behind I apologize!! It's midterms right now and I'm constantly battling the desire to write and the desire to be caught up in schoolwork.
> 
> Also if you want to follow me on twitter my account is @wkndupdate :)

Leslie Knope was many things. A daughter, friend, civil servant, and wife among many other roles she’s accrued in her lifetime, but despite all of her accomplishments and accolades, her absolute favorite role had to be her newest one as a mother.

Leslie’s childhood wasn’t exactly similar to that of her female peers. While the other girls in her grade arranged playground weddings and decided upon names for their future children, Leslie was preoccupied with drafting her future acceptance speeches for the various political campaigns she would undertake and planning which lapel pin would best match her purple pantsuit. It wasn’t that she thought that marriage and children was beneath her but instead she preferred to devote her attention to her studies rather than scribbling baby names in the margins of her notebooks to see what sounded best with her crush’s surname.

She’d imagined herself, like many other girls, with her picturesque future family - a little boy and girl of comparable age and a beautiful, devoted husband to boot - many times. But after the beginning of her relationship with Ben and their subsequent marriage followed by months of impulsive unprotected intercourse, the mental image of those children blurred and faded until she could no longer recognize their faces.

So when those hypothetical children become two pink lines on a plastic stick and, later, three rapid little heartbeats, Leslie feels that she should’ve been more prepared. In fact, it feels remarkably out of character for both herself and her husband that this should happen accidentally.

They finally settle on names for their triple cherries, as Leslie’s come to lovingly refer to them as, while sitting on the couch and eating take out from JJ’s. They’d decided upon Sonia in honor of Sonia Sotomayor, Westley because of their shared love for The Princess Bride, and Stephen in memory of Ben’s father after his unexpected passing earlier that year.  _ That’s the easy part,  _ she figures. Everything that comes after deciding on names could only stand to be more difficult. Leslie picks the cherry off of the top of her waffle and examines it at eye-level before plopping it into her mouth with a smile. Her toes brush against the fabric of her sweatpants when she wiggles them as the result of her sitting cross-legged.

“Hey, when do you think we made these suckers?” She bites into the cherry, her lips puckering as the tartness floods her mouth. It wanes.

“I’m sorry, did you just refer to our babies as ‘suckers’?” Ben laughs.

His visibly pregnant wife shifts uncomfortably and the entire situation is almost laughable, that a woman as petite as her should be tasked with carrying three babies to term. The whole night was scheduled around her growing discomfort and inability to keep anything down other than sugary carbohydrates and if Leslie’s increasing need to change the way she was sitting was any indication, her tiny body was struggling to keep up with the massive changes occurring internally. Ben resigns his pancakes to the coffee table and motions for her foot and rubs small yet firm circles into the balls of her feet when she whimpers and readily presents them to him.

“I already love them so much but do they need to steal all of my energy all the time?” Her palm falls to her protruding stomach. At just over fifteen weeks, her belly has less and less room in Ben’s t-shirt that was at one point too big for her.

“I think,” Ben says while working at her swollen feet, “that you’re asking a really weird question.”

“Well I mean, aren’t you curious? It’s not like we were exactly  _ trying  _ to get pregnant. What time do you think was the one that did it?”

“You know that we could just think back to about fifteen weeks ago, right?”

“Okay, it wasn’t really supposed to be about the technicalities, Ben. I was trying to get you to think about all the times that we’d done it and when I wasn’t a lifeless zombie.” Leslie moans as Ben’s thumb presses firmly against the top of her foot. “Back when I actually had sex appeal,” she smiles lightheartedly and casts her best attempt at a wink in his direction, but Ben knows better. He grabs ahold of her ankles in his calloused hands and pulls her towards him along the couch, earning an amused yelp from Leslie in the process. He presses a hot kiss to her lips.

“This is the hottest you’ve ever looked, Leslie.”

In her old, faded grey sweatpants, mismatched socks, and his t-shirt, she would be inclined to call him a liar if it weren’t for the passion flowing readily from his lips as he leans them back so that she’s nestled against his side to accommodate for her bump.

“Leslie,” Ben finally speaks. “You have sex appeal. You’ve never had more sex appeal, Leslie. Your skin glows and your hair shines and your figure is filling out to support life. And you might be tired all the time but I see you at work or at home and you probably don’t even know that you do it, but you just get this soft smile and you rest your hand against your belly which is just really endearing because I already know that you’re going to be such a good mom to some very lucky kids, and I just,” he smiles. “I’m just so ridiculously in love with you and into you, Leslie, and I am yours completely, no hesitations, whenever you want me.”

She smiles, a languid little expression as she fights to keep her eyelids open. “Well, what are my options for right now?” She asks against his chest.

“Anything,” Ben responds. “Your choices are limitless.”

“Okay, then.” Leslie yawns and wedges herself further into the space between Ben and the back of the couch. “I’m going to sleep for now… but be on standby, okay? I’m holding you to it. You’re going to prove that you meant what you said.”

He chuckles and presses a kiss into her hair. “Okay, babe.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've always thought it happened on the night after the Parks department helps to put on the prom for the high school, but I'm curious as to what your guys' thoughts are. Let me know!


	3. "You did this?"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The triplets conspire with their father to arrange for a birthday surprise for Leslie.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Oh my god oh my god oh my god i'm ridiculously behind in fictober drabbles pls don't remind me because rest assured i know that i'm desperately behind!!! :)))
> 
> Day 3 - "You did this?"

Ben thinks it’s about near midnight when he’s ambushed by his fifteen year old children. The overhead light snaps on with a harsh glow, jarring him further from his sleep as the ceiling fan blades circle rapidly above him. The children all jump or launch themselves in some variation onto his and his wife’s bed, landing beside him with three soft plops. Sonia nestles herself against his side, her head resting against his shoulder like she used to do many years ago when displaying affection towards your father wasn’t considered embarrassing or made you uncool.

That’s when he should’ve known that something was up.

He cranes his head to the right to check the time - ten-forty p.m. He groans. With the shorter days that accompanied early December, it was becoming progressively more difficult to discern the time of day. He also feels increasingly self-conscious of his age, given his newly adopted ‘early’ bedtime of nine o’clock and the three pubescent faces staring back at him. He can’t remember when they would’ve had the time to age as much as they did, but they remain mature and serious despite his best efforts to recall them at a more youthful life stage.

“Daddy,” Sonia angles her chin upwards in a manner that Ben’s seen her mother do hundreds if not thousands of times - she was preparing to dive head first into an intricate plan that, no doubt, had been conceived with immense consideration at each step. The only thing there was left to do now was sit back and enjoy the oncoming spiel. Sonia pulls the plush Christmas blanket tighter around her shoulders. “As you may know, Mom’s birthday is next month,”

“I am aware, yes.”

“Hush,” She commands goodnaturedly. With immense pride, Ben can’t exactly decide which parental figure she’d adopted the insolence from. Perhaps, again, Leslie - but it just as easily could’ve been him. “In the past, Aunt Ann and Uncle Chris would usually only come for New Years’ or Mom’s birthday since the two days are so close. If you recall, they, along with Oliver and Leslie, will be coming for New Years’ this year. Stephen, Westley, and I have been in conversation with Aunt Ann and have arranged for her to be here for Mom’s birthday as well. We just need your approval before she asks for the days off from work.”

“Hold on,” Ben rubs his temples. “You arranged for a guest to stay with us behind your mother and I’s backs?” He looks to Leslie’s empty side of the bed. She was away in Indianapolis to speak on the Statehouse floor in hopes of allocating more funds towards public education.

Westley appears to wilt at the comment then interjects quietly, “No, Sonia did.”

“Okay, listen here you little-”

“Hey! Hey! Enough, stop that,” he barks and the children stand down from each others’ throats, crisis evidently averted. “How many days?”

Stephen assumes authority in the conversation with a collectedness that Ben so rarely witnesses in his brooding teenager. The hormones had hit him the strongest out of the three. “Two nights. Mom’s birthday and the day after.”

“And she’s staying here, I assume?”

“If you say yes, then yes,” Sonia replies. “In my room. I’ll sleep in the living room.”

Ben sighs. When the reality of his becoming a father had finally set in shortly after Leslie’s revelation, so did his intense dread of childish antics when he’d realized the mischief would be multiplied by three. He wasn’t quite sure how just yet, but he had a feeling that this instance of conniving would later be compared to the times that the triplets thought it would be funny to tape one of Stephen’s plastic spiders to the inside of the lampshade on Leslie’s bedside table or the time when they, after being told to pick their dirty laundry up off the floor, flung the clothes over the blades of their ceiling fans.

However, he rationalizes, this scheming stemmed from the desire to make someone else happy rather than serving their own interests. And after the year Leslie had been having, how could he choose to deny her of a surprise visit from her best friend?

“Okay,” Ben finally says. “But no more shutting me out of this. You’re going to add me to your group chat with her so I’m up to date with everything, okay? Hey, listen when I’m talking to you,” he sighs pointedly towards Westley and Sonia, both of whom are engrossed in their cell phones. Ben’s chimes a moment later after having been added to the conversation by his son. Sonia’s contact displays a simple thumbs-up emoticon.

“We think that for full effect that we should pretend like we’ve forgotten about Mom’s birthday,” Sonia shrugs nonchalantly as if her mother wasn’t going to spend the two weeks prior to her birthday dropping hints about turning older.

“Hey now, that’s taking it a bit far, don’t you think?”

“Maybe,” Stephen laments.

“But think about how excited she’ll be when she finds out that we didn’t forget,” Westley smirks and pushes his glasses higher upon his face.

Ben sighs, defeated, and shakes his head in exasperation.

\- - -

The remaining month passes as unceremoniously as December can, given the observation of the triplets’ sixteenth birthdays, the merriment of Christmas, and the excitement of the New Years’ Eve reunion of the Knope-Wyatts and Perkins-Traegers. And, as expected, Leslie is unrelenting in her hints of turning another year older. Unfortunately for her, they appear to fall on deaf ears. Her disappointment does not go unnoticed and Ben’s resolve begins to fracture at the seams at her nightly sullen expression.

“Do you think they stopped caring?” She asks the night before her birthday as they wordlessly lay in bed watching replays of The West Wing. Despite her best efforts, he can see the beginnings of tears in her eyes. “They haven’t even rolled their eyes about it.”

He tries his best to look sympathetic - because in a way, he truly is. The kids hadn’t even indulged their mother in her suggestive jokes and comments like they usually would have. But the looming excitement was enough to incentivize him to keep the surprise under wraps. He was set to pick Ann up from the airport in just four hours and Ben was hoping that Leslie would’ve been fast asleep by now. He gives her hand an apologetic squeeze.

“I’m sorry, babe.” He reaches past her for the remote sitting haphazardly on her nightstand and shuts the TV off. “Let’s just go to sleep, okay?”

“It’s like eleven at night.”

“Yes, and I’m old as hell. Stop reminding me.”

In the shadows of the dark, he sees her closed-lip smile as he presses his lips to her jaw and pulls the comforter up to her neck.

\- - -

Leslie awakes to an empty bed far later than usual for a Friday morning. To her horror, light floods the room from the windows nearest her husband’s side of the bed and warms his pillow. His alarm clock indicates that it’s nearly a quarter past nine and she was beyond tardy for work. She flings the covers back with a gasp as the chilly January air hits her bare feet despite being indoors. She pulls a pair of fluffy socks over her feet with haste and she’s not quite sure if they’re on the correct way when the sound of her children talking in the kitchen shakes her from her fervor.

They also shouldn’t still be at home this late on a Friday morning.

Leslie descends the stairs two at a time, shouting tame expletives and curses at her children regarding their truancy along the way. She launches into her stern maternal tirade while rounding the corner into the kitchen.

“Guys, what are you doing home!? Seriously? Did you turn my alarm off thinking I wouldn’t remember that today is Fri-”

“Look who’s finally awake,” Ann says with a grin while sipping warm coffee out of one of Ben’s mugs with some sort of math reference on the side. Upon closer inspection, it’s the one with the different mathematical symbols and formulas etched along the outside. “Good morning, Leslie.”

Leslie stands dumbfounded in the entryway of the kitchen, her eyes darting between her husband’s casual leaning against the stove and her children sitting at the island, happily munching away on stacks of waffles with haughty expressions.

“What is going on?” She finally manages to mumble before making her way over to tightly embrace her best friend. She finally releases Ann but keeps the brunette within her grasp as she turns to her husband. “How did you?”

“Not me,” Ben grins. He points to the triplets who remain silent across from him. “Them.”

“You did this?” Leslie says, choking over the emotion rising in her throat.

“Don’t say we never did anything for you,” Westley smirks then shoves another bite of scrambled eggs into his mouth.

Ann gives Leslie’s forearm a gentle squeeze to draw Leslie’s attention back to herself. “Ben got you out of work for the day. I’m completely available for whatever you want to do for the next two days,” she says kindly.

Leslie smiles and blinks back the tears threatening to spill over her lashline. As she stands in her kitchen surrounded by the people that she loves most, she can’t help but feel like the most cherished person in the world in that exact moment - upside down fuzzy socks and all.


	4. "That didn't stop you before"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben wants to return a family heirloom to his sister.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize in advance
> 
> Day 4 - "That didn't stop you before"

_I think I need to quit my job,_ Ben texts his sister while frantically searching through his drawers. He’d actually thought he and Leslie would’ve been able to work past the awkwardness of their break up but the events that unfolded earlier today at the high school seemed to prove otherwise. Even now, in the early evening hours with the heat of the moment just a speck in their metaphorical rearview mirror, he couldn’t seem to quell the fury that rose from the base of his stomach when he thought of Leslie’s inconsiderate behavior and brashness. His phone vibrates in his hand.

 _And why’s that?_ Stephanie responds.

 _I can’t keep going in to work and seeing her,_ Ben types back, hoping that the message doesn’t reflect his increasingly frustrated mental state. Even with the overhead light turned on, he can’t seem to find the small, square object that he’s looking for.

_You’re going to quit a job because of a girl?_

He rolls his eyes. Either she was grossly misunderstanding the events leading up to this point or she was being willfully insensitive of his predicament. _No, not because of a girl. Because we broke up._ His phone is silent once more then lights up with Stephanie’s name once again.

_That didn’t stop you before._

Ben is just about ready to throw his phone across the room when his hand makes contact with the soft velvet of a square box in the back corner at the bottom of his sock drawer. He couldn’t remember tossing it into this drawer, but when he flips the lid, the jewelry shines back defiantly almost as if mocking his current situation.

 _I’ve never been in love with one of my exes before,_ Ben finally replies. _I’m going to send Mom’s engagement ring back to you. Tell her that you have it, please._

He trudges over the discarded clothes that now lay on his bedroom floor as the result of his pursuit for the ring box and kills the lights before flopping onto his bed, his eyes stinging either from the lasting sensation of indignation from earlier or from the grief that accompanies the realization that he’ll never get to use the object in its intended fashion. He isn’t sure which one. He clenches his eyes shut and hurls the box as hard as he can across the room, wincing at the loud blow as it crashes against the full length mirror and shatters it. His phone vibrates beside him and he rolls to his side to dismiss the notification through his now readily streaming tears.

 _Just hold onto it for now,_ he’s just barely able to make out with his blurred vision. _I have a feeling._

He shakes violently and inconsolably. When he’d asked his sister to send their mother’s engagement ring just a few weeks after his and Leslie’s relationship began, he never could have pictured a scenario in which he didn’t get to lower himself to the ground and watch her face contort with surprise and unsuppressed emotion. He would have never thought that they would be at each other’s throats during a time when she most desperately needed - and sought - his support.

But when April’s usual asperity is replaced by a gentle knocking at his locked bedroom door, her uncharacteristically quiet voice laced with evident concern, he can’t imagine an outcome that didn’t end like this, with the ring never meeting its intended recipient - campaign or not. He was still her boss, she was still his employee, and there was still Chris’s rule.

There was no scenario in this universe where he would be able to be with her with them both retaining their jobs. And he was naive for ever thinking otherwise.


	5. "Unacceptable, try again"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Leslie cancels her date night plans with her husband. Ben is not happy. (NSFW)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't think that this chapter warrants a boost in the rating, but it definitely is borderline NSFW. Err on the side of caution. (The irony being that I didn't necessarily want to go down a NSFW route for this prompt but alas,,, here we are.)
> 
> Day 5 - "Unacceptable, try again."

Ben is nearly ready to explode with frustration. His underclassmen student interns evidently felt no shame in pestering him despite his planned and announced absence from the office if his constantly vibrating phone serves as any indication. Tacking on the stress of the beginning stages of sleep deprivation and having been cramped in between two strangers for the duration of his flight back to Indiana - all while wearing his typical work attire - he is in no mood to not get his way at the moment.

He walks through the front door of the house and sees the mess that the triplets have managed to make, he’s not in the headspace to bother with pretending to care about the unsightliness. He weaves through the toys and crayons and forgotten dress up costumes, his suitcase rising and falling over each abandoned object as it rolls along behind him.

All he wants is to take his wife out for a nice dinner and then fall asleep later with her in his arms.

So when he nudges their bedroom door open with his leather-clad foot to Leslie sitting cross-legged on top of their nearly-made bed like a petulant child, it’s about all that he can withstand.

“Babe? I thought that we agreed on dinner tonight?” Ben says while restraining himself. The suitcase rolls to an abrupt halt at the foot of the bed. “Your mom took the kids and we were going to spend the evening just the two of us?”

He steps in front of her in an attempt to divert her attention from the TV, but she stares blankly over the top of his head just the same. Exasperated, he reaches up and flicks the screen off manually.

“Come on,” Leslie whines.

“Is any of this ringing a bell to you?”

“Yes. But I don’t want to go,” She whines once more. “No babies, Ben. We can just stay home and _sleep.”_

“They’re not babies, they’re _five,_ and I don’t appreciate you cancelling our plans without telling me.” Ben’s hands instinctively fall to rest on his hips as they so often do when his irritation rises exponentially. His wife’s blue eyes dart rapidly from the positioning of his fingertips to his lips with the slightest semblance of a smirk playing at her own.

“Yeah?” She wraps her palms around her feet and pulls them further under her body so that he can just barely see her red-painted toenails sticking out from beneath her knees. “And what are you going to do about it?”

“Damn it, Leslie,” Ben mutters through his teeth, perhaps with too much aggression. In his defence, though, she was being a brat. She alters the plans without so much as a warning and has the audacity to play coy when called out about it - so it’s just as well, he thinks, that she should get what’s coming for her.

He stalks coolly towards her, his eyes raking her up and down as he considers the best way to make his point overtly clear. Her soft skin remains exposed for his viewing pleasure in her tank top and short pajama bottoms that she prefers to pull up high over her hips to make herself appear taller. Ben pauses at the edge of the mattress. Leslie now sits with her legs dangling off the side of the bed, her knees straddling her husband’s waist and her toes wiggling with faux innocence. He huffs indignantly and undoes the band of his watch, tossing it forcefully to the mattress so that it bounces and lands besides Leslie. He works slowly and bitterly at the fabric along his wrists, unbuttoning the cuffs of his sleeves and then rolls the white shirt up to his forearms with a composed demeanor that ought to unnerve Leslie more than it actually does. There’s a fleeting moment where Ben considers taking a step back to collect himself - but that was before Leslie let out a triumphant hum.

What’s left of his composure snaps and he snatches her arms from behind her, casting them up into the air and above her head as he uses his weight to push her down to the mattress. She yelps - then sighs - then returns to her struggle against his strength as he pins her wrists effortlessly above her head with just one of his calloused hands. His other snakes around her waist, his palm slips under the thin fabric of her shirt and glides across her belly before flipping her onto her stomach.

He angles his legs between hers to prevent her escape, his grip still tight around her wrists as she writhes beneath the weight of his hips hanging partially over hers. The unoccupied hand presses rigidly against her upper back as she tries to crane her head around to look him in the eye, soft whimpers of mock protest spilling from her parted lips.

“What do you say?” He prompts with a harsh whisper against her ear. Leslie grunts and tries to dig her elbows into the bed to use as leverage but she sinks further into the sheets with Ben’s weight on top of her. His hand snakes down her body hastily to land momentarily on her ass before he strikes her more brawn than he’d ever dared to use on her before. Her body jerks beneath him with an amused shriek. “Unacceptable, try again. What do you say?”

“I’m sorry,” Leslie mumbles breathlessly against her bare shoulder.

“Prove it,” Ben growls. “I don’t like having the plans changed last minute. We’re going out for dinner like we decided. Do you understand me?”

“Yes.”

“I’m sorry? Yes _who?”_

“Yes _sir,”_ Leslie sighs then bites down firmly on her lower lip.

“Good girl. Now go put on a dress that’ll make me want to fuck some sense into you. I think I’ll decide just how I’m going to do so while we’re out at dinner - so don’t anger me further. Are we clear, _Miss Knope?”_

“Yes sir, _Congressman_ Wyatt.”

“Good,” he says simply, hoisting himself off of her so she can slink away from him towards their shared walk-in closet, stripping off the two thin pieces of clothing she was wearing. Naked, she casts a salacious grin over her shoulder and steps into the closet.

He was going to keep that little stunt in mind for later.


	6. "That was impressive"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben discovers the magical cure for Westley's teething pains.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Paternal Ben Wyatt is the best Ben Wyatt.
> 
> Day 6 - "That was impressive"

“Oh my god, Ben, I think I’m going to pull my hair out,” Leslie wails before thrusting a screaming baby into her husband’s arms. “Take him. Takehimtakehimtakehim, I’m begging you. I can’t do this right now, I just… I need to step away, I need a time out from this.”

“Okay, but Leslie,” he calls after her retreating form, “Leslie!”

She tosses her hands in the air, exasperated. “No, no. No. Tag, you’re it, good luck with that.”

“Leslie,” Ben says again, with more authority this time.

“What?!” She twirls on her bare heels. She trembles with frustration, gently biting down on her tongue in an effort to hold back the waterworks that threaten overtake her.

“There’s chardonnay in the fridge and I stashed some chocolate in your closet along with some ibuprofen.”

She blinks in response before making her way towards the fridge and pulling out the entire bottle of wine, pausing only to remove the cork from the top of the neck, then continuing on her path to her time-out corner nestled safely within her walk in closet.

“Thank you,” she mutters while pressing the glass rim to her lips and taking a long swig. She eyes their son up and down then shuts the bedroom door behind her.

Ben turns his attention to the little boy flailing dramatically in his arms. Westley’s distressed, red blotchy face stares up at his father, his tiny pupils slightly crossing as he grabs for his father’s face. The occurrence is not a new development for their son, but Leslie and Ben’s concern hasn’t waned despite assurances from their pediatrician. What was more alarming, in their opinion, was Westley’s apparent desire to view them close up, beckoning them closer with his tiny outstretched palm.

“Westley, buddy,” Ben soothes through a hushed whisper. He draws his thirteen month old son closer to his chest, opting to hold him as Ben did during the many late nights shortly after his birth with Westley’s head cradled just below Ben’s chin. He smooths his hand against his Westley’s back. “Does your mouth hurt?”

Westley nods desperately and rubs his eyes with his balled fists. The triplets had begun teething and Westley, in typical youngest child fashion, was hit the hardest with none of the teething coping mechanisms offering him substantial relief. Quite simply, he - and his poor, exhausted parents - were miserable and Leslie, bless her, had just spent the last hour trying everything in her repertoire to no avail while Ben had tasked himself with putting the other two kids to bed.

“Do you want some applesauce, Wes?” He asks while making his way to the fridge, but the little boy shakes his head in disagreement. “No? What about a banana?”

Again, Westley rejects his offer. He buries his tear-soaked face in the collar of Ben’s shirt, his wails continuing though now muffled. Dejected, Ben huffs and rubs circles on the soft skin of the back of Westley’s teeny hand. Determined, he gives Westley’s chin a soft nudge with his thumb, his fingers falling on either side of Westley’s jaw and beginning a firm but delicate massage. Ben’s fingers creep methodically down Westley’s jaw until they meet at the point of his chin and reverses directions, repeating as his cries begin to diminish in volume and then cease entirely. Triumphant, Ben breathes a sigh of relief but refuses to stop the soothing motion. 

The bedroom door creaks open and Leslie’s head peeks out cautiously from behind, assessing her surroundings. Her eyes fall on her husband and her exhausted youngest child, who was already being lulled into a deep slumber. She tiptoes out into the kitchen and brushes her son’s hair from his closed eyes.

“You’re a miracle worker. How did you…? What did you do? What did you give him?”

Ben smiles pridefully. “I didn’t give him anything. Just gave the little guy a massage.”

“That’s impressive,” she breathes a sigh of relief.

“Time to face the facts, babe,” he boasts quietly. “I just have magic fingers.”

“Hell yeah you do,” She giggles lasciviously before pulling him down for a kiss, the taste of wine and chocolate lingering on her lips. “Why don’t you put him in his bed and we find another use for your _magic fingers?”_

“Yeah?” He grins.

“Yeah, I’m just the perfect amount of wine drunk that it’ll be sloppy but the thought of it is kind of doing it for me right now.”

“Just how much wine _did_ you drink in there?” He asks amusedly. Leslie gives his arm a playful push.

“Shh, put your son to sleep. Don’t take too long.”


	7. "Yes I did, what about it?"

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ben asks Leslie to tell him about Mark.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Rated NSFW for language.
> 
> Day 7 - "Yes I did, what about it?"

Ben tosses and turns in Leslie’s bed, unable to forget the conversation he’d had earlier that day with Tom. 

He’d made it a point to swing by the Parks department at least once daily to see Leslie, sometimes brining her coffee or a snack, but more often than not just stopping by to say hello in the middle of the workday. This time, however, Ben had purposefully planned to drop in when he knew she’d be out of the office.

He had been considering a very serious question - long before this visit, actually - but he had wanted to hear everyone’s opinions before he actually asked Leslie. Unsurprisingly, Jerry was the one that acted with the most enthusiasm after Ben announced his intention to ask Leslie to marry him, but the others had been gracious enough to at least appear outwardly excited for him. Ron’s silent nod of approval, unsurprisingly, conveyed more sentiment than Jerry’s string of incoherent babbling ever could.

“Before you ask her though, you should make sure she’s on the same page as you,” Tom says disinterestedly from his desk. His fingers fly furiously over his phone screen as he drafts some sort of text message.

“I’m sorry?” Ben asks, stepping closer to Tom’s desk.

“I’m just saying,” he says, pausing his composition to look Ben in the eye. “One time Leslie slept with this guy that worked here in City Hall and she was hung up on him for _years._ If I were you,” he sighs and returns his attention to his cell phone, “I would be extra confident that she’s actually over him.”

Despite his best efforts to put the encounter out of his mind, Ben can’t seem to shake the thought of Leslie with someone else. He stares at the dark ceiling, followed by the window, then settling on staring at the outline of his face in the mirror that she has set up across the room.

“Did you ever date anyone in City Hall before me?” He finally breaks the silence, and the voice inside of Leslie screams at her to answer no, to deny everything and lie through her teeth and just hope that the truth never reveals itself but instead she finds herself admitting her past romantic entanglements with one Mark Brendanawicz. He stares dumbfounded at her. “You slept with that city planner guy?”

“Yes, I did. What about it?” Leslie shrugs nonchalantly, failing to see the issue. Ben’s quiet for a moment as if carefully considering his next question.

“Nothing, nothing,” he shrugs and stares at the ceiling. Finally, he asks while refusing to make eye contact, “how was he?”

It’s not that he actually _wants_ to know how skilled of a lover her previous partner was, but rather, he hopes that her answer will dissuade the growing feeling of inadequacy currently pooling within his chest. Truth be told, it was a thinly veiled attempt to get her to declare him crazy for feeling insecure and to profess her unyielding loyalty to him - Ben. Instead, Leslie does neither.

“He was fine, I guess.”

 _Fine,_ Ben thinks and mulls her answer over. It isn’t exactly the answer that he wants to hear, but he figures it could be worse. She could’ve chosen to stroke his ego by saying Mark’s performance was subpar, or that he lacked the stamina to truly pleasure and satisfy a woman of Leslie’s caliber - but at least she doesn’t say he was good or, even worse, _great._

But the visual of another man’s head between Leslie’s thighs, making her gasp and writhe makes his blood run hot. His stomach drops, twisting and convulsing with every imagined cry of ecstasy from Leslie’s swollen, parted lips, every fiber of his being overtaken by a darkness with no name. Ben clenches his eyes shut but Leslie’s toes curl and her fingers tighten around the man’s hair as she becomes more and more aroused. Ben shoots upright into a sitting position.

“Why was he just ‘fine'?” He pesters before reaching over Leslie to flick on the bedside lamp. “Like did he do something that was a turn off?”

“Ben, honey,” she interrupts his rambling with a concerned hand on his forearm. “Why are you asking me this? Why do you want to know?”

“Because earlier today Tom said-”

“Okay, really? I’m going to kick his ass.” Leslie pulls on his arm and snuggles up next to him when he reluctantly resumes his position next to her. “He was ‘fine’ because he wasn’t great. I thought he was at the time, but he wasn’t.”

Ben turns to her earnestly. “Well, what did he do well?”

“Ben,” Leslie protests.

“I’m serious, tell me.”

“Babe.”

“Leslie, tell me.”

“Okay, fine. The best part about sleeping with Mark was that he set the bar so low. Like _so,_ so low.”

“What?” Ben whips his head around to look at her, causing him to strain his neck. He winces and massages the pinched nerve.

“The bar was underground. It’s embarrassing for him and me both. For him, because I think he really thought that he was great and for me, because I thought that night was the hardest I’d ever be able to come. So you can imagine how _pleasantly surprised_ I was the first time you went down on me.”

“Really…” He ponders aloud. Thinking back, it’s very possible that she had nearly come as soon as he put his mouth on her.

“Baby,” she says with two of her fingers resting lazily and sultrily against his lower lip. She brushes her thumb against the stubble growing along his cheek. “Nobody eats pussy like you do.”

Ben hums triumphantly then gives her hand an affirmative squeeze before reaching over her once more to turn the light out. “Good to know,” he grins arrogantly in the dark.

“Wait, what? That’s it? You’re going to sleep after getting me all bothered?”

“You have a rather large sexual appetite, Leslie,” he says lightheartedly, the sting of jealousy long gone following her admission.

“W-what? You’re the one that made me this way.” He rolls away from her onto his side to face the wall, laughing despite himself. “Ben! Finish what you started!”

“Good night, Leslie.”


End file.
